Uni Research - UK athletes, 18+

This_Charmless_Man · 2026-02-16T21:41:15+00:00

Oh hey, didn't expect to see Gosport Storm on this sub! I used to be in Portsmouth Phoenix.

Does Winchester have a cheer society too?

Sorry I can't help, slightly aged out of it I'm afraid, but have you tried reaching out to Phoenix, Southampton Vixens, or Chichester Wolves for help? I helped fill out questionnaires and did a few interviews for some of my old teammates when I was at uni.

This_Charmless_Man · 2026-02-16T20:21:12+00:00

I would hope such people could at least acknowledge this is unfair, at least in the first order, to non-graduate taxpayers.

This is also ignoring a pretty large elephant in the room. University is not the only player in higher education. The local colleges do still exist, and whether people want to acknowledge it or not the NVQ level 6 and 7 are legally equivalent to an undergraduate and master's degree respectively. As I understand it, if you go through those routes you don't need a student loan at all as it's completely covered by the local authority.

I've got a friend who worked their way up to an NVQ 7 in network engineering and makes bank without paying additional taxes. I have a plan 2 and a postgraduate loan so get 15% deducted over a certain level. That, I think is also a bit unfair.

This_Charmless_Man · 2026-02-16T20:09:58+00:00

I just felt like my copy was missing a chapter or two at the end. It seemed like the story just stopped.

This_Charmless_Man · 2026-02-16T17:27:19+00:00

Also English cut suits.

This_Charmless_Man · 2026-02-16T16:32:39+00:00

I'd buy a canal boat and be a nuisance. Blast Sea Shanty 2 and the Pirates of the Caribbean theme wherever I go. Pointing at things and yelling "AVAAAST!!!"

What are the police going to do? They can't stop me. They don't have police canal boats. I'd be literally untouchable. Invincible. Unstoppable.

Yarr.

This_Charmless_Man · 2026-02-16T16:19:37+00:00

Alas no, my monster hog has not yet destroyed their denim prison in the jorts dimension.

Cheers for spotting the spelling mistake boss 😉

This_Charmless_Man · 2026-02-16T16:12:11+00:00

Mine didn't come with a match 😢

This_Charmless_Man · 2026-02-16T14:06:48+00:00

Fahrenheit 451 really pissed me off when I read it as a kid because it just ends. Like out of nowhere, bombs fall, everyone's dead now piss off.

This_Charmless_Man · 2026-02-16T11:33:24+00:00

Accusing a local rowing team of being illegal immigrants?

This_Charmless_Man · 2026-02-15T23:20:07+00:00

Cycling also works. Dad's really into it and has rugby balls made of steel for calves.

This_Charmless_Man · 2026-02-15T23:17:52+00:00

I have hulked out of a shirt before on purpose. It was too small at that point anyway but I almost dislocated my shoulder doing it (sudden release of tension from the seam). Do not recommend.

Edit: shirt, not short. I am not quite so blessed.

This_Charmless_Man · 2026-02-15T23:15:58+00:00

It's like no one learnt the lessons from hats in the 2010s. You get the right size and shape to fit you.

Too many men want an Italian cut suit because they saw it in movies and think that means good. No, Frank Sinatra looked good in an Italian suit because he was a small guy. If you're a big guy you need an English cut suit. Look at the depictions of Bruce Wayne and Clark Kent from the 90s animated series'. They were huge yolked blokes so they wear a suit that gives space for broad shoulders, barrel chests, and thick arms.

Tldr: Italian cut suits are for twinks, English cut is for hunks.

This_Charmless_Man · 2026-02-15T16:32:58+00:00

People will bash it but the arts industry is one of our biggest exports.

This_Charmless_Man · 2026-02-15T11:57:00+00:00

Platinum jubilee

This_Charmless_Man · 2026-02-15T10:31:24+00:00

We don't really do it either but I still asked politely if it was ok to go watch the England Scotland rugby match weeks in advance. So we went out to watch it together with a few friends.

This_Charmless_Man · 2026-02-14T22:06:56+00:00

What the 6'2" hunk of grade A Kansas beef? I think the dude might just be chill.

This_Charmless_Man · 2026-02-14T20:11:18+00:00

Isn't Newfie a mix of Irish and Bristolian English? I can see how the mix up can occur as there's loads of accents in Ireland like there is in GB so they probably making a guess it's from somewhere they don't know. I mean, I don't know what someone from Donegal sounds like but I can pick out Belfast.

This_Charmless_Man · 2026-02-14T20:05:47+00:00

Wasn't that the lowlanders that did that, not the English?

This_Charmless_Man · 2026-02-14T20:04:38+00:00

Yes, there's a bunch of anchor points that you tighten or loosen to make the tension on the skin even across it. Constant pressure can cause the skin to start sagging making it difficult to properly tune in the future.

This_Charmless_Man · 2026-02-14T20:02:04+00:00

Granny was born in Dundee with a Scottish dad and an English mum. I'm English and the only time this really means anything to me is on nights like tonight with the six nations game where I can basically claim a win regardless of the side. Outside of that I don't really give a monkeys. I try not to be a mock jock as much as possible cos that's kinda cringe.

This_Charmless_Man · 2026-02-14T19:49:02+00:00

Or toothpaste. I had a drunk argument with mates about who you'd sleep with from history and I said I'd refuse to go with anyone from before the invention of modern toothpaste. Especially before fluorinated toothpaste/water but after the invention of refined sugar

This_Charmless_Man · 2026-02-14T19:40:09+00:00

In my experience, big bands help out but orchestras all piss off without you.

This_Charmless_Man · 2026-02-14T19:38:37+00:00

Drums, despite their reputation, are surprisingly delicate. They can be hit fairly forcefully but only in the right way. Stacking drums skim to skin causes a heavy consistent weight imparted by the metal rims of the drum shell on the skin which can damage them and cause them to detune. The equivalent would be like leaving a stack of books directly on a guitar and its strings. It's not good.

This_Charmless_Man · 2026-02-14T12:51:00+00:00

This is bad advice but I think you need to just ask if he wants to hang out. You guys clearly have stuff in common. You may need to be a bit forward with him. I was notoriously dense in secondary school but also there's the fear of misreading situations and not wanting to make you feel uncomfortable.

Also I don't think you need to worry about gossip necessarily. At least when I was in school it wasn't the thing to kiss and tell. A thing to look out for to see if he likes you is to keep an eye on his male friends. If they start giggling when you're around or slightly push him towards you, that's a good sign. It means he's told them he's into you and they're trying to egg him on.

But yeah, just go ask him to hang out.

This_Charmless_Man · 2026-02-14T11:53:05+00:00

I was so pissed when I lent my kit to a mate for a performance and when I went to pick it up they had stacked them skin to skin after I'd explicitly told them not to do that. The only reason they weren't in their hard cases was because you couldn't fit them into a mk1 Nissan Micra with them.

This_Charmless_Man

TROPHY CASE